@umare said, "so, do you? have all you need?"
back in canada, when he's standing in his bar looking at all he's built for himself in the last few years, it's easier to convince himself he has everything he needs. it's the first time in his entire life — aside from those few weeks he believed there was a future to be had with sissy and harlan — that he actually feels like he has something real, something stable, something for him. there was never space for him in this world before, either because he was nothing or because he was too much. now, he finally has the chance to just be him, no powers to keep him on edge and without the feeling like he's constantly getting lost in irrelevancy, drowned out by everyone around him who was always going to be more than him.
❝ kind of, like, an existential question, ❞ he points out, trying to deflect for a moment, because he wants to say yes. for once, he's the successful one, he's happy, he has a life— and he didn't have that before when he and his siblings first left the academy. he's choosing to be away from his family now in a way that no longer feels like being invisible, because he realized that might be the only way to figure out what he wants, but there's a part of him that longs to be more present in their lives. he's just not sure he's ready for that. ❝ i mean, can anyone really have everything? ❞ he misses his family: both the family he grew up with and the family he chose, but sissy and harlan are gone now, and viktor's spent the last few years accepting that. ❝ but i'd say i'm doing okay for myself. ❞ that much is at least true, anyway. ❝ i like it there. but— what about you? do you? i mean, what's it like, being a mom? ❞